MILLIONS of excited fans are gearing up for a David and Goliath-style FA Cup final between league winners Chelsea and relegated Portsmouth at Wembley this Saturday.

But the famous cup has an exciting history of its own.

Back in 1895, a victorious Aston Villa won the FA Cup – beating local rivals West Bromwich Albion. The hallowed trophy was brought to town for proud fans to view. On the night of September 11, while it was given pride of place at a sports shop in Aston, the cup was stolen without a trace.

No-one was ever arrested or charged with the theft and its mysterious disappearance remained unsolved for more than 60 years.

That was until an 80-year-old man called Henry (Harry) James Burge confessed to a national newspaper that he had committed the burglary at the shop, owned by William Shillcock.

The Sunday Pictorial published the exclusive story, with the headline “soccer’s biggest riddle” on Sunday, February 23, 1958.

Burge even posed for a photograph showing how he broke the shop’s rear door open with a small crowbar. In his admission, Burge stated that he and two other men entered the shop and stole several pairs of football boots along with the cup. He alleged that the silver FA Cup was melted on the night it was stolen, to be made into fake half crowns. Discrepancies were soon spotted by Birmingham police between Burge’s tale and a contemporaneous report in the Birmingham Post.

The Post’s story read: “Mr Shillcock arrived at the shop on the morning after the theft and saw the back room covered with plaster, looked up and saw a hole in the roof.

“The robber or robbers got onto the roof from the entry and this was done by climbing with a hand and foot on each wall. The lead on the roof was stripped off and the lath and plaster broken through. To get back again a pair of steps found in the shop were used.”

The report also stated some shillings were stolen.

Efforts to recover the original FA Cup proved fruitless. A £10 reward was offered for information leading to an arrest, which was never claimed. Aston Villa bosses were forced to pay a fine of £25 because the trophy – which cost £20 to make in 1872 – was nicked while in their care.

Chief Supt Benbow decided that no realistic possibility of a conviction was available and the file was closed.

Records held by PC Tubbs of Birmingham CID showed cops already had details of forging gangs and had made some arrests in the Newtown area where thieves were stealing sliver and making forged half crowns. The crooks were known to be disposing of the coins through betting at the old Birmingham racecourse in Bromford Bridge. Burge had never been arrested in connection with forgery. David Cross at the West Midlands Police Museum said Victorian police did not keep or even submit crime reports in 1895. Written statements had only come into use in 1890 and pocket books in 1896 and the first real written record of a crime was recorded by the clerk to the court who had to write everything down the witnesses said.

Mr Cross said that crime files held in Sparkhill, dating back to 1944, revealed that Burge was an opportunist thief who also had time for shop or housebreaking as, and when, the opportunity presented itself.

In July 1957, aged 75, Burge pleaded guilty to housebreaking and was sentenced to two years’ probation. The following year, he appeared at Birmingham Quarter Sessions and was sentenced to seven years’ preventive detention for stealing from cars.

The Recorder, Mr R C Vaughan QC having heard of Burge’s record of 42 previous convictions going back to 1897 and on hearing that Burge had been sentenced to a total of 46 years and 11 months imprisonment during his life time, said: “When you appeared last year I told you that if you did this sort of thing again instead of retiring from a life of crime I should send you to prison for a long time, Because of your age I had hoped to do what your counsel asked (leniency) but society has to be protected from a man such as you who has spent a lifetime in stealing”

Burge was released from prison in 1961 and placed in an old people’s home. He died in September 1964. Did he really steal the cup? Burge confessed to the crime, but differences in the reports and property stolen means the truth is still unknown to this day.